Do laptops only work on APUs?

Mine does. It's about all my inverter is good for.

 

Seeing a pattern here...

 

The laptop has it's own battery so I typically charge it with inverter while the engine is running and run it on battery when the engine is off.

 

I always idle. I always just charge the laptop. Then use it. Have a small inverter. Also a couple other things I charge with the inverter like a dustbuster. Also have a small bug zapper light plugged into the inverter. My laptop is a new MacBook Air. Before that an older Mac laptop. Never any problem charging off my inverter. Only problem I have had with Mac is becoming obsolete.

 

The reason you need a inverter is because the chargers are above the 12-14 volts the truck produces. Many batteries are 18 volts and above and need above their output voltage to charge.

 

It’s been awhile since I had this discussion but don’t they still charge, just slower?

They actually make adapters to charge a laptop via the vehicles 12v power ports... so I’m thinking it’s not an issue of “need”.

Plus the inverter is used to invert the power supply from DC (vehicle) to AC (house) which is how laptops are normally powered.

Well, actually they take the AC supply from a household outlet and then converts it to DC as the laptop (via a battery) actually runs on DC power.

So in a truck environment one is actually taking an inverter for the DC truck power supply converting it to AC so the laptop’s power brick can then convert it back to DC so the laptop battery can utilize it.